While you were sleeping

Mideast expert Barry Rubin highlights here that: "Indian investigators have confirmed that Pakistani intelligence was deeply involved in the massive, bloody Mumbai terror attack in 2008, killing 166 people." As he notes, this report has garnered virtually no notice, including from the U.S. government.

Rubin speculates: "The strategy of ignoring this problem fits into the broader strategy of the Obama administration: buy short-term quiet and apparent popularity at the price of strategic decline and future crises." And he asks, "does the Obama administration want to be an ally of those who murdered 166 people in Mumbai, the equivalent of backing those who carried out the September 11, Lockerbie, Spanish train, and British underground attacks?"

I think the Obama administration has two additional motivations for its silence. First, at least some officials won't or can't admit that "outreach to the Muslim world" won't solve all our problems. Second, I think simple cowardice is also a factor.

Our relationship with Pakistan is certainly complex and we have a lot to lose if relations deteriorate. But there are already reports that Pakistani officials have been helping the Taliban kill Americans in Afghanistan. Now we learn that Pakistani intelligence was behind the recruitment of an American to go to India to identify terrorist targets, including Americans.

Just what more do the Pakistanis have to do to get our attention?